Angry rooster visits chicken restaurant every day and yells at people

A rooster has ironically taken up residence in the meadow across the street from Gus's Fried Chicken in Collierville, where he eyeballs customers as they arrive for lunch Monday afternoon. Photo by Jim Weber.

From The Commercial Appeal:

When you’re a foot tall, red-feathered and crow, it’s hard to be taken seriously even if you have the swagger of John Wayne.

A red rooster sauntered down South Street in Collierville three months ago and now makes daily visits to Gus’s Fried Chicken at 215 S. Center, cock-a-doodle-doodling to herald his arrival.

It’s not lost on customers and staff that the rooster is visiting the one place that’s built its success on battering and frying up the rooster’s kin-fowl — one breast, wing or thigh at a time.

“Every morning, you can hear him crowing coming down the street,” said restaurant manager Debi McCaffrey. “He crosses that street and just pecks around in the grass.”

Customers aim cameras hoping he will pose next to the restaurant’s sign, which includes a logo of a rooster.

But this rooster marches to the beat of a different drumstick. He’s not a mascot or there to picket. No one knows where he came from or why he visits Gus’s every day.

He manages to cross the street every day in spite of steady traffic. Or he stays on his side of the street to spend time as still as a lawn ornament under a real estate broker’s sign.

McCaffrey wants the town to adopt him as a mascot like it did Amos the cat, who lived for years at English Country Antiques on Town Square. Amos died in 1981. A plaque was placed in the square in his honor.

Neighbors don’t recall anyone keeping chickens, which is legal in Collierville as long as they’re in coops.

He most often appears in a fenced field across from Gus’s. He’ll crow in the forest area of the field and will poke his head out when someone calls to him.

Collierville Animal Services has tried for months to catch the rooster before he gets attacked by a raccoon or other predators the plucky, wily rooster may face. They want to take him to a farm where he can be with fowl that still have a pulse.

“I’ve tried reasoning with him,” said shelter manager John Robinson. “I told him it’s not good for him to be hanging around Gus’s and that he might get himself in trouble. He doesn’t listen.